Disaster Management in Pakistan

On 26th October this year, thirty six detain Chilean mine workers were rescued by drilling a qabalistic hole into the mine. A month later, twenty nine mine workers in Newzeland died after re principal(prenominal)ing trapped for days in a mine. scurvy happening steering cost precious lives. In Pakistan, too, casualty manage handst is non up to the mark. Be it the withering earthquake, the catastrophic floods, the outbreak of fervencys or the aftermath of give way blasts, the direction was very suffering.Certain measures worry National misadventure Management Authority (NDMA), Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA), and fork up 1122 were taken but none has borne fruit yet. Lack of funds, scarcity of men and machinery, lack of awargonness and preparedness of general public, hard demography, negative berth of media, and delocalization of hap prudence centers has added to the calamity of disasters. A realistic approach, good cultivation to workers and public, localization of disaster management centers, public awareness programs and positive division of media must be ensured for the proper disaster management in Pakistan.Until straightaway almost every disaster has dish Pakistan but the required resolution is given to none. The October, 2008 earthquake in Northern areas of Pakistan is a grim admonisher of the scale of disaster. Almost eighty thousand people died and m some(prenominal) towns devastated. Though, no single government with limited resources tail end fill out with such a calamity, yet our governments response was much late in the hard hit areas. Timely and efficient response could assume salvage many lives.The recent floods of July-August have withal seen the demonstration of poor disaster management in our country. Though, no country is prepared for such devastating floods, our governments response could be much better. Instead of aid the people in the affected areas, our government set all their direction in app ealing for aids to other countries and arranging conferences for the donor countries. The fire management is also much poor. Few months ago when fire stony-broke out in a female hostel in Rawalpindi, the management did not have the ecessary tools to bring the situation under control. Moreover, the aftermath of bomb blasts also shows that our country is not prepared to cope with the disaster-like situation. One of the main cause of this pathetic situation of our disaster management is that the workers are not properly trained to cope with any disasters. In other countries, proper training is provided to the workers in one field to cope with that particular disaster. alas in Pakistan, the same workers are hired for every disaster to cope with.Most of our disaster management organizations are not provided with sufficient staff and machinery. The workers are much less as compared to the scale of the disaster. Also, the workers do not have all the necessary equipments to plentitude a disaster. Moreover, the facilities like fast hold to the disaster point are also lacking. Our uneven demography also plays a big hurdle in efficient disaster management. Sometimes, the areas hit by a disaster are out of reach, thus, badly impact the rescue activities. Hard demography also adds to the scale of a disaster.Even a minor disaster results into a bigger loss of life and attribute because of the demography of our country. This was observed in the recent floods whose originating point was the northern areas and brought devastations in other parts of the country. Delocalization of disaster management units is another cause of poor disaster management in Pakistan. All the units are controlled from the federal or provincial capitals which may become a hurdle in traffic with a disaster in time. Unawareness and unpreparedness of the general public is also one of the reason for poor disaster management.Our people do not know how to make do with a disaster when they are caugh t with. People, sometimes, use methods which may increase the scale of a disaster instead of controlling it. Also, most of the people are unprepared to deal with a sudden disaster which results into many losses. Lack of funds with the disaster management units is also a case of poor dealing with a disaster. The disaster management organizations do not have sufficient funds to buy the machinery necessary to deal with a disaster.In order to deal effectively with any disaster in Pakistan, the government must provide proper training to workers. This is how they can deal with a disaster professionally. Moreover, the government should confer proper funds to disaster management units. All the disaster management units must be delocalized. Disaster management unit in Chitral must not be monitored from capital of Pakistan or Peshawar. A local management body can effectively deal with a local disaster. Public training programs must be initiated so that the general public is aware how to deal with a disaster.The youths must be trained in particular areas of disasters, like fire, flood, so that that can be called whenever such disaster emerges. Moreover, special television programs should be aerial to aware the people how to deal with a disaster effectively. Disaster management plays a big role in a country like Pakistan where disasters are most frequent. Though, in the past much attention was not given to disaster management in the country, the government must go for the above mentioned suggestions in latter and spirit to cope well with any disaster in future.